Tender
by dreamoverdrive
Summary: When Tahno tears his ACL at the last meet of the season, he is left disconnected from the force that has driven his life. He goes to physical therapy where he begins working with a girl from the rival team. Soon he's recovering in enemy territory and he finds himself with an overwhelming uncertainty regarding whether this is a good or a bad thing.
1. The Beginning

**So I am very, very excited about this! Cross country training has just started for me and the pain, angst, and general take over of my life (don't listen to me, I really do love it) has inspired me to write about it.**

**I am aware that there is already a cross country AU written by therentyoupay so I have made an effort to make this fic different in order to avoid any clashing. Cross country season will be finishing about when this plot starts so that will be one large difference in itself. If you haven't read therentyoupay's Personal Record, I highly recommend it because it is an absolutely incredible read. She has given me the go ahead with this project and she was perfectly lovely about it.**

**So at the risk of boring you anymore- here it is!**

* * *

Blood sang fiercely under his skin creating a frenetic rhythm that propelled him forward. His footfalls raised clouds of dust that swirled around the sticky skin of his calves while he left a clinging haze behind him. Jarring impact after jarring impact slid up and through his body and even though it felt like he was dying, he knew with every fiber of his being that he was _flying_.

The burn of his lungs under his tight chest, the dull throb with every perfectly timed extension of his limbs, and the whirlwind of activity at the back of his mind calculating pace, time, and competition—it balanced in a consuming state of being. The dusty air in his throat and the sharp cry of fierce triumph held between a dry tongue and the roof of his mouth—_It belonged to him._

Here, Tahno was king. He could hear the persistent scuff of racing flats behind him, accompanied by labored breathing and a seething frustration directed towards him, the leader of the pack. Tahno's primal smirk unfurled, uninhibited by the slow drip of sweat between his lips that tasted like salt, dirt and adrenaline. He wore the scream in his limbs around his head like a scorching crown.

_Catch me if you can._

The press of uphill under the balls of his feet signified pain and if he had the breath to laugh he would have crowed a challenge. _Is that all you have? I want to see you try and break me. I want to see you fail._

But he didn't because Tahno didn't get here by being foolish at important moments. Whatever anyone said about him, he knew racing strategy better than his own name. At least, in moments like these he did.

When he was caught up in the physical rush and carefully chaotic balance of his mind during races, his name wasn't important unless people were screaming it. He made his last curve with his elbows tucked, his arms pumping, and his body leaning at the perfect angle and **there it was.**

The world was flooded from the disjointed focus into sharp detail that sated his hungry eyes. Flickering plastic streamers in the air, the gradual slope of undisturbed dust he was about the set churning, the roiling mass of colored bibs and people that began to scream at the sight of him, _it called him_.

The last spurt of adrenaline kicked in to chase away the bite of pain and his knees pumped higher. His feet were hardly touching the earth and he thought to himself: _Let's see what you've got. Let's see if you deserve this._

He'd just begun to make out the details of faces when it all went to hell.

Something had disrupted his stride. The cadence of body straining and streaking over trail had been all that existed and now he was lost in an all too panicked confusion at this in-between state. He was reeling because _this wasn't part of the plan. He wasn't in control. What is this, whatisthis—_

The pleading complaints that his body had been hissing to him under the hard press of his will came up in a wave of vengeance because control was a joke when he was feeling this weightless.

And then there was an anchor, pulling him back down—

_It began as a sharp burn in the back of his knee like the electric flare of a concentrated blue flame. He felt himself moving closer and closer to the ground below but the pain was building too quickly along the taut line that was bearing the strain. It seared with a harsh ferocity and tightened underneath the surface of his skin. The line pressed up against the over-stretched flesh with the intent to release and he felt his mouth open in a desperate howl—_

_Had his joint melted because **thisreallyfuckinghurt**—_

_Fibers began to fray and the sickening logic the back of his mind was screaming along with every part of him **pleasestoppleasestoppleasepleasestoppleasenopleaseno**_

* * *

A final rip that tore more than just his knee, hazy burning darkness with a mouth of heavy dirt pressing cuts into his gums, screaming but the wrong kind _because why would they scream with their king in the mud?_

* * *

Tahno woke to the stench of harsh chemical against his nose and the scratch of synthetic fabric beneath his cheek. Unnatural white light shone above him when he slowly cracked open his eyes. He shifted with strangely unresponsive muscles and felt a hot metal brace heated by his skin clamped over his right lower half.

They must have him on drugs because there was a dull haze that had crept through his mind that made it strenuous to reach for memory and reason.

** The meet.**

He jolted upright and his skin pinched against the blunt edges of the metal. He looked side to side in the room at the lone IV (thank god it wasn't hooked up to him or he really would have gone ballistic) and the ancient blocky tv set up on a white plastic stand. Where was he? The last memory of branding pain washed over him and a dread so thick rose in his throat that he wanted to retch it up.

The door swung open and a man with a craggy wrinkled face and a crisp white coat walked in. The sound of footsteps echoed strangely in Tahno's ears. Everything felt strange: this place, these people, and above all his own body. A nurse followed behind, the obnoxious shade of her purple scrubs made all the worse by the stark contrast of the colorless room.

The man drew up beside Tahno's cot and stood carefully still, as though trying not to startle him. Tahno held back a sneer, denying the venomous part of him that was far too prideful and far too scared to be of any help in this situation. He'd be lying if he said he wasn't scared shitless bit that didn't mean he was going to let on just how hard his pulse was hammering in his temples.

"Hello, young man." The voice was deep and placating. Tahno just stared up. There was too much crazy in him to respond to something as neutral as greeting; especially a greeting like that.

"You've had a rough time of it."

At that Tahno let out a sharp burst of laughter that sounded more like a bark of fury than a sound of mirth. He leaned his head back against the thinly padded pillow behind his head and stared at the ceiling.

"How long till I'm running?"

He'd asked a question but it came out like a statement with the old weight of his certainty (arrogance). Because it couldn't be _that_ bad. Nothing could be bad enough to keep him away from running. Furthermore, nothing _that_ bad ever happened to someone like Tahno. If there ever had been someone like Tahno.

The doctor said nothing and Tahno flicked his blurry gaze back to him. Now a hint of hysteria colored his voice as the pitying eyes framed by long routs of leathery wrinkles just stared. "How long till I'm running?"

The doctor stared at him gravely, the sparse shadows on his face becoming more pronounced as he dipped his head. "We think you've torn your anterior cruciate ligament and strained your posterior cruciate ligament. It's hard to say when you'll have full faculty of your—"

"_How long till I'm running?"_

The doctor tried to smile but it just looked like a grimace of coffee yellowed teeth and suddenly Tahno felt about four inches tall and fragile enough to be crushed. The knotted and veiny hand clapped him on the shoulder and he flinched away. "Get some rest, son."

The door shutting with a click barely registered in Tahno's mind as he stared numbly at the blank wall, consciousness creeping back to leave him searching for answers to questions he could never have imagined.


	2. The Aftermath

"Tahno. Look at us."

The strained voice holding back frustration was too familiar in the all new environment. It was out of place. Tahno was trying not to think about anything, trying to keep the steady lap of memories at the edges of his consciousness at bay. He couldn't handle it, at least not yet. He couldn't handle remembering with deliberate intention exactly what he had lost.

So he stared at the white wall till his vision was lined with a bright glow that only made his headache worse.

"Tahno." There was a pause heavy with the attempts of the two other people in the room to form words. They weren't quite sure what they were trying to say. That they were sorry? _Holy hell, Tahno we're so fucking sorry. _That they wanted to help? _We want to get you out of this white hell hole. _That they were scared? _Stop staring like that and start acting like a dick again we miss you._

In the end it all sounded like too much and too little to voice so the group of three sat in silence, waiting for something to change. But nothing did.

The cheap clock on the wall whirred at the hour mark and Ming stretched out his legs. Tahno felt an irrepressible jealousy that made him want to gag with self-loathing because _these were his teammates and how could he feel that? You're sick Tahno, but not that sick._

A cell phone going off filled the stifling silence. It was Shaozu's because who else would have Highway to Hell as their ringtone at such an obnoxious volume? He swore and slid out of the room to take it and Ming just stared at Tahno, waiting for a flicker or irritation or condescension.

Nothing.

"Tahno, you need to get it together. Yeah, it sucks but you need-"

Tahno whirled on him, a spray of lank black hair and burning eyes. "Yeah it does suck doesn't it," he hissed, spit flying from his mouth as his lips curled back in a snarl. The silence had been building to this because damn it, he wasn't used to not being able to mold silences and words to his benefit. "And don't you _dare _tell me what I need."

After the initial surprise and shrinking away from the intensity of Tahno's anger, Ming's eyes narrowed.

"Fine. I don't know what else you want me to say because hell if I know what I should be doing."

He paused and pushed himself to his feet, looking down at Tahno. Tahno glared at the height change, hating the fact that he couldn't stand up to match him. Wasn't this what their team was all about? Matching each other? Matching jokes, matching times on the track, matching the number of hook ups that month—_and what the hell were they going to do with a gimp in the works?_

It had been more than his nature—it was his very habitat. The admiring glances in the hallways at school, the whispers of the incoming freshmen who hadn't seen the _legendary Tahno_, the simpering pressure of feminine hands on his biceps, the brush of glossy lips near his ears to whisper something mindless but still welcome because the sound meant he was on top and getting what he wanted. More than anything, it was the parting of the other runners when it was time to line up for races. In track everyone knew Tahno got lane one. In cross country, he stood where he wanted on the starting line That bang that split the collective tension signified the start of all that he had lived for. If he wanted his place back he'd have to crawl there and his knees had never felt more bruised.

His dependency had been apparent then but he'd never thought of it as a problem. Who could have ever thought the king would be dethroned so ungracefully? And now it was the elephant in the room no one wanted to discuss.

_If Tahno can't run, what is Tahno?_

Shaozu stuck his head back in through the door, eyes flicking back and forth between his teammates. "We gotta go, Ming."

They both looked expectantly at Tahno but his gaze had drifted back to the wall where he could bury the unnatural rise of shame in him with blankness.

They stood like that for a moment before Ming sighed and moved over to the door. "We're here for you, Tahno."

Something thick rose in his throat before he swallowed it back down harshly as he watched the door shut behind them.

* * *

Tahno pressed his head against the cold car window and tried not to re-live the wheelchair ride down from the hospital. He'd only spent one night there. He could have gone home that day but he must have looked terribly shell shocked because the doctor told him to wait 24 hours just in case.

_In case of what?_

His fingers had dug into the leather wheelchair grips on the armrests (the snide part of him that was still alive and kicking made several comments about how he was sitting in something dead _how appropriate_) while the nurse wheeled him through long white corridors. He looked around at the repeated carts, empty turquoise gurneys and uninterested eyes that slid right over him. Time stretched languidly he had began to believe he was living in some strange part of his mind under a coma.

A coma would have been better than this shit.

The sunlight that hit him when the sliding doors opened almost made him hiss. (Holy fuck, it hadn't even been a day.) Memories from months of running under sunlight were quickly stifled before they could come back up to remind him of where he had been just days earlier. They were half formed promises whispered to him when his concentration while he stared at the dull metal of his new brace. The hot drip of sweat down his neck, the dull burn of moving muscles, and the cry of victory held just behind his teeth—

Tahno swore and slammed his head against the window, holding it there. He heard his father shift in the front seat to look back at him but there was no comment.

Tahno focused on unclenching his muscles and slowly let his eyes drift to the large metal thing clamped around his leg. The long sturdy brace kept his knee in complete immobility. It almost felt like there was no knee there at all. He couldn't feel blood pumping there and he wasn't sure if the leg would even respond if he tried moving it. All he could feel was the top layer of skin. It was as though a sleeve of his flesh was encasing nothing—nothing at all.

"We'll be there soon."

His father's heavy voice made Tahno want to crawl back up to his hospital room. At least there he had been alone. No one to look at the inanimate creature eating his leg, no one to look at the purple circles darkening under his eyes, no one to look at _failure_.

The car eased to a stop and Tahno looked up. A large building made of varying shades of tanned brown rose above the car. Columns of fitted rocks marked the glass door entry way. On the top, in strangely pale blue writing was White Lotus Physical Therapy.

Tahno just stared impassively till his door swung open with a neat click to reveal the wheelchair waiting for him. Tahno closed his eyes and he heard the impatient scuff of his father's business shoes on the black top.

"Tahno. Let's go."

The words were spoken with sharp certainty at the follow through of orders and once upon a time Tahno might have looked back with the same certainty, albeit a little more vicious than cold, and replied _no._

But once upon a time wasn't now so Tahno opened his eyes. He swung his legs to the side and allowed himself to be lifted up and over into the saggy seat. He closed his eyes again to the comforting yet disorienting darkness so that he wouldn't have anything to remember when his dad started wheeling him inside. Memories were the new weapons and he was going to make sure he kept his fears unarmed.

The _swip _of the doors opening and the low mutterings of a lobby room greeted his ears. Perhaps if he kept his eyes shut long enough he could forget that other people were there. The fact that they were looking at him and judging him was disconcerting. He used to love the weight of eyes on him and he savored the taste of others' curiosity. The adrenaline of having attention in the palm of his hand was like a high— _I wonder what he will do next_. It was a rush. Now it was just suffocating.

His father's muted conversation with the secretary lasted a few moments and all that Tahno caught of it was the hushed _is he ok? _And his father's reply in a tone that clearly meant there would be no more discussion _he's fine. _Tahno felt his lips jerk in an effort to make an ironic smile and there was an awkward silence before he was being wheeled away again.

After a few minutes there was a halt and Tahno sensed shifting in the air in front of him that signified another presence. He resisted the urge to creak an eye open, already committed to having nothing to visualize because hell if he was having another nightmare of white coats and carefully disconnected faces that couldn't be bothered to care because he was _just another _patient.

"This must be Tahno!"

The voice was middle aged and deep. He could hear the false enthusiasm in the words as well as the slight confusion as to why the patient had his eyes shut and why he was gripping the arms of the wheelchair like a vice.

"Yes." His father's tone was measured with a professional quality. As if Tahno were something he was selling. "He's been having some difficulty… adapting."

"That's just fine. We'll be taking good care of him here. He'll be up and going in no time." The mindless promise made Tahno want to leap up and screech _liar. Liar, liar, liar._

His dad gently clasped a hand on his shoulder and Tahno flinched in surprise. "Tahno, do you want me to come with you?"

His voice had grown gentler and the tender pressure of the hand unleashed a stream of memories. A scuffed wooden table with paper plates, laughter around cheap mouthfuls of boiled or microwaved dinner, the low buzz of childhood tv shows in the background… Those were times before business calls, business suits, and the business face.

"Could you wait for me, Dad?"

He felt his dad's surprise and then the hand squeezed before letting go. "Of course, Tahno."

Footsteps clacked down the hall behind him and with each step Tahno felt smaller and smaller. He felt the other man move behind the wheelchair and grip the handles to propel them forward.

"My name is Tenzin and I'll be your physical therapist."

"Not Doctor Tenzin," Tahno asked with a hint of scorn in his voice.

"Just Tenzin. Would you mind telling me why your eyes are closed?"

"Yes."

"Alright. That's fine. I'll do my best to talk you through anything we want you to do."

Tahno felt childish but childish was better than scared. Tahno hated being scared. A door clicked open and he was wheeled in. "Alright, Tahno, Jinora and I are going to help you on the examining bed."

"Jinora?"

"I'm right here." Her voice was young. What was a kid doing in a physical therapy center? He'd opened his mouth to ask when strong hands and small ones wrapped around his arms to brace under his elbows.

"Alright, you're going to try and stand with all your weight on your left leg. Don't put anything on your right. We've moved the table lower so you'll be able to turn around and sit on it."

Tahno nodded, making sure his face was schooled into apathetic dignity. Dignity wasn't something he had a whole lot of anymore so he invented it in the careful set of his face. Whatever anyone said, Tahno was a proud creature.

He pushed himself up and _damn how could this have happened so fast._ He felt unsteady and unbalanced in the air without restraints or aids to keep him standing. His right leg jerked and buckled sharply. He was struck with icy horror and he was about to try again, _because it was his fucking leg why wasn't it working_, when he was firmly steered and pushed down on the hard padding of the examining table.

"Tahno, you must wait till you start putting weight back on that leg. If it is your ACL as your doctor believed, it will be unstable. When it's time for you to go, we'll see how much it can handle."

Tahno's breathing was shallow and he hardly heard the reprimanding words, unable to believe how quickly his leg had folded under him. Tahno didn't trust much but he'd always trusted in the readiness of his own body.

"Now we're going to perform the Lachman test. It's going to tell me if it really is an ACL tear that we're looking at. It's painless and it only involves me going through one simple motion with your knee."

The metal around his knee loosened abruptly before being lifted away with a sharp click. He felt naked without it. The hot skin cooled quickly and Tahno felt an immeasurable rush of relief that he had kept his eyes closed. He hadn't seen his leg ever since _then._

In his nightmare the skin had been mottled with dark splotches of red and purple that bloomed and spread like drops of dye in water. Ridges of tissue rose up into shiny, puckered scars that criss-crossed like some kind of map to hell and the skin felt like it was stretched to the point of tearing over bone. After awhile the leg morphed to the soft, folded black of the withered flowers from bouquets he received after races. It was deflated and shriveled and overall, unbelievably _dead_.

He knew both were silly notions and that everything wrong with his leg was wrong under the surface (_like you _whispered the spiteful voice in his head) but Tahno was an appearance oriented person. If his leg was ruined, it didn't just feel ruined. It looked ruined.

"Alright. You're going to lay back nice and easy now." Tahno let himself be pressed down backwards on the table. Cool, dry hands closed around his knee and lifted his leg up gently but left his ankle resting on solid surface. "Now I'm just going to hold your knee at a ninety degree light bend and feel around your tibia to see if it's being held by your ACL."

The hand settled right beneath where knee moved down to calf and began to gently push the knee up to the ceiling in small repeated movements. Tahno was struck by an overwhelming sense of instability in his knee. The joint seemed to slide without order as if the puppet strings holding it together had been cut. He forced his breathing under control. He couldn't panic. Not now.

"Now we're going to do a pivot test which is very similar. You're doing great."

Tahno repressed a sneer that he knew stemmed from the fear and suspense growing in his head. He didn't want reassurance but at the same time he needed it.

His entire leg was lifted off the table. The hands closed around his calf and pressed his knee slightly back towards his torso. The process was repeated several times before his knee was stopped and held in the lightly flexed position. Fingers felt around the lower base of his knee.

"Look at his tibia," Tenzin murmured. Fingers slid over the protruding bone and Tahno shivered. His leg was gently set down and Tenzin let out a short breath.

"Are you ready to hear your diagnosis?"

Tahno stiffened. _No. _"Already? Don't I need an MRI?"

"We'll get you an MRI soon but this physical examination was a very clear indicator."

Tahno's pulse spiked. Was he ready? Something was expanding in his chest and his rib cage felt like stretched bands of metal. "Yes. I'm ready."

Tenzin's voice began to rapidly fill the silence, speaking in a tone meant to engage him. "The ACL is one of the four main ligaments in your knee. The ligaments connect bone to bone to give joints stability. The ACL and the PCL cross each other inside the knee joint to connect the femur and the tibia. Luckily, your PCL seems to be fine. The ACL's primary function is to keep the tibia from slipping forward. For example, when you're running down hill or slowing from a run to a stop—"

"Yeah, well what's wrong with mine," Tahno bit out, fingers clenching in the crackling paper he was lying on.

A pause and then, "You've torn yours completely. We have several options but as I assume that you want to return to competitive sports, surgery would be the best to avoid future pain. I recommend having some pre-rehab physical therapy for about three weeks before going into the surgery. The better you're moving before the surgery, the sooner you'll be moving even better afterwards. The surgery itself will involve taking grafts from surrounding tendons to reconstruct—"

"Dad, stop it! He's freaking out!"

_The darkness behind his lids was smothering him with words that he saw rather than heard. __**Torn. Surgery. Pain. Reconstruct. Pain. **__His head was spinning hard and fast but it was hard to tell because his eyes were still closed. He could feel the rapid rotation around and around and around. If he could see the room he was in, he was sure it would be a blur but everything was a blur— sound, feeling in his knee, thoughts—everything. He felt dizzy and his breath was coming too fast but he couldn't stop the sharp gasps __**In. Out. In. Out. In Out. In Out.**_

"Hey there, Pretty Boy. C'mon. Open your eyes."

Tahno felt his eyes creaking open before he could stop them at the sound of the new voice—the voice he remembered from another time that felt lives away from where he was now. The longing in him lied, saying when he opened his eyes that he'd be back. There would be grass under his feet, weight on both of his legs, and challenges in his eyes and voice.

The initial brightness faded and he fixed his gaze on inscrutable, lucid blue eyes. They regarded him nearly indifferently, judgment carefully concealed to reveal nothing. They just watched him, waiting for something he wasn't sure he could give.

She'd called him Pretty Boy. The old name that had been snapped venomously, hissed in an effort to make him feel ashamed. It had been used to try to convey her hatred for the extent of his vanity back to him so that he'd feel _something_ close to shame. She'd said it in such a neutral tone, he wondered if he'd misheard because those could not have been the same words. Here he was sat, hair plastered to his head with cold sweat, lips chapped and bitten into ruin, eyes purpled and blackened and filled with creeping red webs across the whites—

_And she was calling him Pretty Boy? As if he was the same person. As if nothing had changed._

He just stared, locked in between past Tahno that had only been gone for a little under twenty-four hours and present Tahno who was just starting to take root. He wasn't sure if his words should be biting or just as neutral as hers but he was sure of one thing—he hadn't felt anything like this since he'd been laid out on his stomach with a screwed up knee.

Tenzin coughed. "I suppose you two know each other."

Her eyes slid away from his and he was struck with relief and disappointment in equal amounts. "Yeah. I guess."

Tenzin nodded, seeming to accept the lack of explanation. Tahno looked at the man for the first time, matching the voice to the person. He had a long face with a strong chin covered in a neatly groomed dark beard. His head was bare and his eyes were pale grey like the calm of a storm. Tahno could see why so many people came to him. Just looking at the man was reassuring.

"Tahno, you're going to need to tell me if we're moving too quickly for you.'

"I'm fine," Tahno said in a brittle voice, instantly defensive at the implied need to coddle him.

Korra snorted, "Yeah that little fit you had just now was real fine."

Tahno glared. "Who let you in here?"

"Um, I work here? _Uncle _Tenzin told me we were going to be getting a runner in. I wanted to meet him." Her nose crinkled. "I'm not so sure anymore."

"Getting a runner in?" He pushed himself up into a sitting position and the paper under him crackled loudly. "What am I, your new pet gerbil?"

Her eyes narrowed. "Well I certainly wasn't expecting a rat."

"You're one to talk, Ferret," Tahno hissed.

"Alright then," Tenzin said loudly, clapping his hands together. "That's plenty of that." He said the words with an air of calm as if they had just been light heartedly squabbling over a pack of gum. Tahno shot her one last scathing look that she quickly returned.

"I'm going to go find Pema," she said, turning to leave.

"Wait outside for a moment, Korra. I need to speak with you."

She spun back around with a sharp flick of her brown ponytail, eyes widened in disbelief. "Oh, so this is my fault—"

"I didn't say anything about fault, Korra. "

"No, but you're going to drag me out there and give me that half hour patience lecture that—"

"You guys aren't being very professional." All eyes in the room turned to focus on Jinora, who had one hip pressed out and her arms crossed. She regarded them all with a disapproving brown stare.

Tahno suddenly felt very tired as the toll of this first real interaction as a new person washed over him . He rested an elbow on his thigh to prop his head up and his eyes were drawn to his injured leg for the first time. He'd always been pale but on the brown exam table his leg looked fluorescent white. He just stared. It had taken one moment to end up here and these people still hadn't told him when he'd be getting out.

"Jinora, why don't you ask Tahno if he'd like you to give the muscles around his knee a heat patch? They might be able to use a little fresh circulation. I'm going to talk with Korra for a moment outside. I'll be right back in to finish giving Tahno a rough sketch of his treatment plan. "

Tahno said nothing at his careful exclusion from the conversation. They were giving him a moment to cope and holy shit did he need it.

"But no heat on the knee, right?"

"Right."

Tahno glanced up as the door clicked open to take one last look at the girl. Her eyes were fixed on him and he saw something foreign but increasingly familiar in her bright blue irises.

Pity.

He scowled harshly and the look was gone before he could even be sure that it had even been there. She scowled back and slid out of the room with all the grace of an athlete.

Tahno was left with the hollow sense of remembering challenges he used to be able to take.


	3. Bitterness

**Author's Notes: This is very, very late. Oops. I'm going to get back into the swing of this so expect more sooner. **

* * *

Tenzin stared down at her with a heavy grey gaze. "Korra—"

"Alright, I'm sorry. He looks pretty rough and I probably shouldn't have done that but I'm just used to—"

"I want you to be one of his personal trainers."

Her mouth dropped open and words died in her throat. There was silence as she tried to form of coherent sentence that didn't question Tenzin's sanity, blood alcohol concentration, or identity. She finally settled on an incredulous laugh. "I'm sorry. I don't think I heard you correctly. You want me to _what_?"

"I want you to be one of his personal trainers," Tenzin said slowly, his voice and eyes steady as always.

"Are you crazy? We spent about thirty seconds together and by the end of it we were calling each other rodent names!"

"Korra," he said in a rare display of impatience, "When that boy was wheeled in here he had his eyes closed."

Korra just blinked. "Is that supposed to mean something to me? I guess he's more eccentric than I thought-"

"He was scared."

Korra snorted. "Tenzin, I don't think you've met Tahno the Wolfbat. He doesn't _do _scared."

Tenzin looked away, back at the door. "Is that Tahno the Wolfbat in there, Korra?"

And wasn't that the question of the hour? She'd walked in, expecting some young, bright-eyed kid with some severe runner's knee or plantar fasciitis (or as she liked to call it, foot ache). She most certainly hadn't expected the rival team's captain entirely without hair gel and eyeliner, wheezing up a storm mid-fit with Tenzin and Jinora freaking out above him. She didn't really know what had possessed her to call him by his old nickname because deep down she knew that no, this was not the same guy she'd encountered before. To be honest, she wasn't sure who was sitting in that room. Neither was she sure if she liked him or not.

"Alright, suppose he has changed. Why do you want me to work with him?"

"Because you were familiar enough to calm him down."

Korra rolled her eyes. "Tenzin, I've met him like three times tops and each occasion was memorably unpleasant."

Tenzin shrugged. "So what? You were familiar. He's going to be going through a hard time, Korra. A large part of his identity is going to be taken away. Working with you will help remind him of who he was."

"A major jerk?" She crossed her arms. "This might be a good thing. Maybe he needed a little upset to get him headed in the right direction."

"A little—" Tenzin broke off and understanding washed over his features. "You weren't there when I told him."

Korra shifted. "Alright, let's not be cryptic."

Tenzin gave her a don't-push-your-luck look. "He's not in for a little upset, Korra."

"Again with the vague hinting—"

"He tore his ACL."

Korra stopped abruptly and she felt her breath hitch. ACL injuries were the taboo of every athlete. They were painful, required surgery, and left you out of commission for up to a year. A sense of disbelief made her shift uncomfortably. She couldn't imagine having her ability to run and compete taken away from her for that long. Who would she become for all that time? She flicked her gaze to the door.

"Are you certain?"

"Quite."

Korra leaned against the wall with a groan. "So you want me to hold his hand for the next year while he slowly regains his ego and unpleasant personality?"

"Yes, I do want you to work with him," Tenzin said in a measured tone. "But I won't make you."

Korra raised her eyebrows. "I'm being given a choice?"

"Of course you are. You've been raised to make your own decisions and I know forcing you into anything would only make problems for everyone involved."

Korra stared down at the floor, a mixture of pride and strange disappointment making her scowl. "How many times a week would I work with him?"

"We'll have to see after what he's up to after his surgery and what his insurance policy is like."

She took a deep breath and pushed off the wall to stand up straight. "And what about pre-rehab?"

"Well, I'd say four days at the most?"

Korra glared off into space, wheels turning in her head. She'd be working with public enemy number one. The one guy hated by her entire team. During track season, even the sprinters partook in throwing dart sessions at his news article pictures that went up in the locker rooms. He was a jerk, a sleaze, and intolerable to the point of madness.

She looked back at Tenzin. "I'll do it."

* * *

"I'm not going back like this."

"Tahno, this isn't an optional kind of—"

"What, are you going to make me?"

His father's eyes narrowed at him, calculating. Wondering where the quiet, complacent kid with the giant metal knee brace had gone. "I can certainly try," he said slowly.

Tahno snorted derisively, even if it was a bluff. There was no way he was going back to school like this to hobble around for the two weeks before his surgery. People would ask questions, eyes wide when they saw him shambling around like a comatose zombie. Teachers would give him pity and maybe even pat him on the back when he left class. Not too hard though. They might knock him over. While Tahno loved attention, he _despised _pity.

"I'll do the work on independent study. I don't understand why I have to go back to the masses to get my coursework done—"

"Tahno," his father said sharply. "How many times have I told you to refer to your peers in a respectful manner?"

Tahno shrugged, but he knew how far to push it. His father drummed his fingers on the back of Tahno's desk chair and looked at Tahno's leg that lay outstretched on the bed. "I know this is a very traumatic time for you right now but your education is of upmost importance."

"Do you think that I would deliberately do something to sabotage myself?"

And that was the main selling point of his whole argument. No, Tahno wouldn't. He would never do something to jeopardize his own future, at least not intentionally. His father let out a long sigh and eyes drifted around the room. "I'll call the school today. Do you need any ice?"

Tahno shook his head. "No thank you," he was sure to say as his father turned and left the room. He was finding it easier and easier to be polite to his dad when he found he needed reassurance he was too numb to ask for and help hauling himself up the stairs to his room.

When the door shut with a quiet click, Tahno rolled over on his side and slowly moved his legs nearer to his chest. It was a relief to be alone. A relief to be able to curl up and admit yes, he needed to create a little hollow for himself.

His knee felt stiff. It reminded him of the way his tendinitis that never seemed to go away acted up on the days after long runs during season. But this was a different kind of stiffness because it crept through, slowly and sluggishly till his entire knee seemed to ache with it.

His cellphone beeped from his bedside table but he felt such aversion to the idea of outside communication that he picked it up and threw it to the ratty beanbag on the other side of the room. It might have been his coach, asking where the hell he had been. It might have been Shaozu or Ming telling him to get his head out of his ass and reply. For all he knew, it could have been last weekend's hook up calling to see if he was busy.

Tahno dragged a blanket up and over his legs. Yes, he was busy in fact; busy feeling very alone and very sorry for himself.

* * *

"Bolin, give me my cookie back."

"Mako, did you really need this?" Bolin waved the saran wrapped thing in front of his face a few times. The plastic shone dimly as Mako's hand shot out. Bolin yanked the cookie back, beginning to unwrap it as quickly as he could.

Mako lunged across the table and there was a scrabbling mess as fingers sought a slippery hold. Finally, Mako's arm emerged victorious. He unwrapped the cookie and took a triumphant bite, though he quickly grimaced around the mouthful.

Korra snickered. "Is the cafeteria baking not up to standard?"

He shrugged and took another bite. "It's been better."

"If Bumi saw you eating that we'd have to drag your corpse away from the track when he was finished with you."

Mako scowled and took a bigger bite. "Season is over anyways. He can't hound me with meal plans during the offseason."

Asami reached over and smoothed some of his hair down and Korra looked at her sandwich. "Don't go crazy reintroducing yourself to junk food," Asami said lightly. "I don't think any of us would know how to handle a hyper Mako."

"You know," Bolin said, gesturing with one of his breadsticks at Asami. "He's actually pretty fun."

Korra snorted and Mako sent her an irritated look. Korra had to bite her tongue before she said something very bitter and entirely called for. Ever since he and Asami had started dating midway through cross country season, tension between him and Korra had soared to ridiculous heights.

"Hey, are you guys still up for movie night this weekend?"

Korra forced a smile. Trust Bolin to break the strained atmosphere that he was entirely oblivious to in the first place. "Sure. What's the line up?"

"The illustrious 1986 Chopping Mall," Bolin said, the greasy breadstick now splattering them all with his enthusiasm.

"And the Breakfast Club," Asami said while pressing Bolin's arm to a safe stop. "We need to start branching out."

"Any chance we'll be watching something from this decade any time soon?" Mako asked.

"Nope."

Yet another passive aggressive challenge was sent her way but this time it was happily returned.

"Hey," Bolin said suddenly. "Do you guys remember at the meet when that ambulance pulled up?" Korra felt something sinking in her stomach as she picked at one of the cucumbers peeking out of her sandwich. "One of the guys heard from another one of the guys who heard form one of the meet coordinators that it was Tahno!"

Silence fell and Korra just stared at the table that seemed to be reflecting dull black eyes back up at her. "Tahno," Asami was the first to say in shock. "Tahno as in _Tahno_."

"The very one! They said his shoe got caught on one of the rocks and he twisted his knee when he fell. He didn't get back up so someone called an ambulance."

Mako snorted. "It must have been pretty bad if he couldn't haul himself over that line."

"Mako, bitter doesn't suit you," Asami muttered.

He just shrugged. "I was one place up higher than usual. I finished right with that one badgermole senior."There was a pause and he finally said, "But it can't have been that bad. I mean, he'll be back for track season."

The words were said with a slight hint of resignation and everyone nodded in agreement. Korra felt knowledge prickling under her skin but she just couldn't bring herself to voice it. If she told them where Tahno was now, what he looked like with his back bent and hair dull, it would be violating something. She just couldn't find that old malice that used to surface so readily whenever his name was mentioned.

"You ok, Korra?" Her eyes flicked up and there was a vindictive kind of pleasure in the attention. _You aren't so quick to glare when I look beaten. _But there was genuine concern in his voice so she smiled back at him.

"I'm fine, Mako."

The bell blared and the cafeteria exploded with the crinkling of empty wrappers and the shouldering of backpacks. Everyone at the table hauled themselves up. Asami leaned to press a quick kiss to Mako's cheek before sliding around to Korra's side of the table.

"C'mon, Korra. I'll walk you to class."

She hurried Korra into the current of people, leaving Mako and Bolin staring after them in bemusement. Korra stifled a sigh of relief. For some reason, lunches had seemed to grow longer and longer as of late. Maybe it was her muscles storing pent up energy from the mandatory post-season break or maybe it was the knowledge that soon she'd have to dive into physical therapy with Tahno. _Tahno. As in the __**Tahno**__._

"Hey, Korra." She looked up into Asami's concerned green eyes. "Are you feeling alright?"

Korra shrugged it off. She was never one to brood and this was just becoming ridiculous. "Yeah, everything is fine. It's just post season blues."

"Do you want to sneak a run tonight? If we do it in my neighborhood Tenzin will never know."

Korra smiled faintly at the idea of physical therapist Tenzin finding out she had been skiving off her rest period. There would be hell to pay. "No, but can I spend the night? I've got Beifong's packet due tomorrow and I'd like to be in close proximity to someone who actually understands calculus."

Asami squeezed her shoulder. "Only if you help me BS the chem lab."

Korra laughed as she saw her classroom coming up through the stream of students. "Deal."

* * *

"Do you remember the sequences?"

"Yes, Tenzin."

"Are you positive?"

"Yes, Tenzin." He scowled and she patted his arm. "Relax. You should be less worried about the physical therapy part and more worried about us biting each other's heads off."

"You're not inspiring much confidence in me."

"Stop worrying."

"I'll stop worrying when you stop giving me reason to worry."

This time she made no rebuttal, opting to let herself zone out. This was probably the last bit of quiet she'd have for a good while.

The lobby door opened with a soft swip and she looked up, pasting an overly-bright grin that quickly wilted on her face.

"Hey, Tahno."


End file.
